


chicken soup

by accidental_optimism



Category: MAAS Sarah J. - Works, Throne of Glass Series - Sarah J. Maas
Genre: F/M, Injury AU, Injury Recovery, Tumblr Prompt, elide is smol and hurt, fluffy crap, lorcan can't cook, lorcan is territorial fae bastard #1
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-12
Updated: 2016-12-12
Packaged: 2018-09-08 02:28:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,394
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8826838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/accidental_optimism/pseuds/accidental_optimism
Summary: When Elide gets a serious knife injury, Lorcan has to take care of her. And even though he'd probably kill anyone else who tried, he really isn't very good at this.Elide doesn't really mind though. Based on a prompt on fanficy-prompts on Tumblr.





	

**Author's Note:**

> i was bored so i found a bunch of prompts for fics and this was one if the results so here y'all go
> 
> pretty sure Lorcan only knows how to roast entire animals on a spit so the chicken soup is not up to scratch
> 
> this seems to be set in eyllwe and none of the other characters are there (unnecessary inconveniences) and it's post eos
> 
> i had way too much fun writing this - hope u enjoy (and as always hmu with feedback yo)

Lorcan hears the knife strike with a dull "thunk" and feels like he's going to throw up.

When he turns Elide is lying on the ground, the knife sunk right to the hilt in her thigh. Her face is contorted; she must be screaming, but his ears are ringing and he feels the blood draining from his face.

He stumbles forward and falls to his knees beside her. The knife isn't very large, but it's buried deep in her flesh. If it has hit her artery...

He damps down that poisonous thought before it can immobilise him.  He's dealt with wounds in battle before, but that was with powerful Fae soldiers. Elide's fragile human body is different. He needs to leave the knife in her leg to prevent as much blood as possible from escaping, and he needs to get her to a human doctor. Fast.

He pulls off his shirt and tears it up to make a makeshift bandage and tourniquet. His hearing has seeped back in as he concentrates on the work and he can hear Elide making little high-pitched moans that make him want to kill something, strangle the life right out of it. She's suffered so much in her life. How can they submit her to more pain? How can the gods allow it? 

The last knot tied tightly, he creeps his arms under her knees and shoulders, lifting her slowly from the ground. He is so gentle; and yet she still screams, a jagged, hoarse sound, as the knife moves in her leg. Lorcan takes a shaky breath. He holds her to his chest as tightly as he dares. She moans. "I'm sorry," he whispers, barely more than a breath.

Then he begins to run. 

***

The doctor is a grim Eyllwe man, dark-skinned and built lean and sharp. He ignores Elide's sobbing cries as he draws out the knife and cleans the wound. Lorcan has to clutch Elide's hand like a lifeline to prevent himself from burying an axe in the man's head.

The knife missed the femoral artery, thank all the gods, but Elide has still lost a lot of blood; the sharp-faced doctor prescribes bedrest and constant supervision. Lorcan pays the man grudgingly - he imagines Elide's voice telling him that there was no way to spare her the pain anyway - then scoops her up once more and carries her to the nearest habitable inn with rooms available. He lays her down on the crisp white sheets and pulls a blanket over her upper body to keep the cold at bay; she still sobs at any but the gentlest touch to her wound. Now she seems to calm, and her breathing slows to that of the deepest sleep. Lorcan watches her chest rise and fall rhythmically and feels like the inside of him has been scraped raw. 

She looks so small. Helpless. Elide is never helpless.

Lorcan turns away, and rings for the maid. 

***

He is struggling to make chicken soup when she stirs, but he knocks over the pan in his hurry to get to her, spilling the mush into the fire. Shit, he thinks as a burning smell fills the room, but now Elide's rosebud lips are parted and she is making a soft sound as she stretches-- And then gasps in pain. Lorcan feels a twin pain in his chest and fumbles for her hand, folding in in both of his. "Try not to move," he says hoarsely. "You took a knife to the thigh."

Her eyes flutter open, and he's gazing into her huge brown eyes, drowning in them, and she smiles through lips white with pain and he is smiling too--

No. No no no. She hates him and he betrayed her and he can't take advantage of her weakness. Maybe she still feels something for him - and he really, really, with-all-his-crooked-heart hopes she does, but she deserves to make the decision of whether to forgive him when she's better, herself.

He breaks eye contact with a jerk and scrambles backwards - what in Hellas' name has happened to his reflexes, to his Fae grace? - then heads back to the hearth to scrape the blackened soup off the stones and attempt this accursed recipe again. Every time he feels her gaze on his back he spills something, knocks something over, pours far too much salt into the yellow sludge in the pan.

Hellas save him from this punishment. 

***

The mixture is thick and gloopy and the chicken is tough as leather by the time he's finished, but Elide puts on a brave face and swallows every bit of the bowl he gives her. He drops a spoonful of soup down his front because he's too distracted watching her steady chewing to put it in his mouth.

When he approaches her bed to take her bowl she suggests - in a neutral voice - that he take a break to clean himself up. It's at this point that Lorcan realises that he's still only wearing his coat, his chest bare since he ripped his shirt up for bandages. 

Maybe it's the combination of every emotion and embarrassment he's gone through in the past few hours, but for the first time in almost 500 years Lorcan feels his face heat. Elide is gaping at him. He growls, turns on his heel and stalks towards the bathing room. 

***

The doctor told Lorcan to change the bandages every few hours, so that's what he does. The doctor had to cut open the leg of her breeches so as to access the wound, so Lorcan just folds back the fabric to reveal the bandage. He tries to ignore the shape of her leg as he unties the cloth, but he still fumbles a little with the knots, wincing when Elide gasps in pain.

He asked here if she'd rather the maid did it, but she just rolled her eyes. Now a combination of her silky soft skin and the obvious pain she's in makes him clumsy and flustered and he really wishes he'd insisted. It doesn't help that the doctor seems to have tied an unnecessary number of tiny knots that, even in human form, Lorcan is struggling to unravel. 

He manages to untie each of the knots until the last one. It reaches a point where he is considering going to find some shears to cut it off - if he scrabbles at the bandage any more he'll cause Elide some serious pain.

A soft touch on his hand stills him. Elide has pushed herself up to a sitting position, face white but determined. Lorcan growls dangerously. "You need to lie down." She smirks weakly, and Lorcan can tell she's thinking about Aelin's name for what he is being right now. Then, before he can do anything but hiss, her lips pressed together in a strained white line, she leans forward and begins to untie the knot, tiny nimble fingers finishing it in a few seconds. She sinks back to the pillow.

Lorcan feels incredibly inadequate.

Apparently reading his thoughts in his eyes, she smiles, though her face is still pale. Brown eyes see right through his own, and find no wrong there. Her small fingers wrap around his large ones. "I wouldn't have anyone here right now but you."

Tentatively - his skills in this department are somewhat rusty (as in, unused) - Lorcan smiles, feeling it go crooked at the ends. No one... No one has ever been _nice_ to him, and it's ridiculous, sentimental, but he feels a sort of warm glow in his chest and Elide is smiling at him even though he can't do anything right and she ate all of his disgusting soup and wanted him to change the dressing instead of the maid and he kneels there beside the bed for a whole two minutes just kind of smiling like a moron until Elide moves a bit, and winces. His smile turns into a snarl, teeth bared. "Don't you even _think_ of doing that again."

She chuckles softly. "Okay," she whispers.

Lorcan rises to his feet. "I'm going to get more bandages. Don't move." Just in case she's feeling rebellious, he glares at her again. "And I mean it. I'm trying to take care of you, remember?"

Her voice carries after him as he crosses the room, low and sincere. "And you're doing a wonderful job."


End file.
